Dan P. McAdams, Ph.D.

Dan P. McAdams is a psychology professor at Northwestern University, School of Education and Social Policy/Foley Center. His research interests include narrative psychology, the development of a life-story model of human identity, generativity and adult development, themes of power, intimacy, and redemption in human lives, modernity and the self, autobiographical memory and psychological biography. His publications include The Redemptive Self: Stories Americans Live By. New York: Oxford University Press; The Person: A New Introduction to Personality Psychology, (4th Ed.). New York: Wiley; and Interpretting the good life: Growth memories in the lives of mature, happy people. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 88, 203-217, by Bauer, J. J., McAdams, D. P., & Sakaeda, A. (2005). McAdams has received the William James Book Award and the Theodore Sarbin Award, both from the American Psychological Association. The Sarbin Award honors work that demonstrates "notable achievement" in one or more of the fields to which the late psychologist Theodore Sarbin contributed. "These include narrative psychology, contextualist theory, social psychological theories of hypnosis and other innovative theoretical work that is 'critical' in the broad sense of the term." McAdams was selected for his "body of work," but in particular his "work on life narratives was seen to be of exceptional quality." The nomination noted his recent book, The Redemptive Self, which shows how the motif of redemption distinguishes the life stories of highly generative Americans - adults who give their all in tending to the well-being of future generations. The book is based on almost 20 years of research.